Degree: degree of comparison
| Values: | Abs | Cmp | Equ | Pos | Sup |
Degree of comparison is typically an inflectional feature of some adjectives and adverbs.
Pos: positive, first degree
This is the base form that merely states a quality of something, without comparing it to qualities of others. Note that although this degree is traditionally called “positive”, negative properties can be compared, too.
Examples
- [en] young man
- [cs] mladý muž
Equ: equative
The quality of one object is compared to the same quality of another object, and the result is that they are identical or similar (“as X as”). Note that it marks the adjective and it is distinct from the equative Case, which marks the standard of comparison.
Examples
- [et] pikkune (pikkus+ne) “as tall as”
Cmp: comparative, second degree
The quality of one object is compared to the same quality of another object.
Examples
- [en] the man is younger than me
- [cs] ten muž je mladší než já
Sup: superlative, third degree
The quality of one object is compared to the same quality of all other objects within a set.
Examples
- [en] this is the youngest man in our team
- [cs] toto je nejmladší muž v našem týmu
Abs: absolute superlative
Some languages can express morphologically that the studied quality of the given object is so strong that there is hardly any other object exceeding it. The quality is not actually compared to any particular set of objects.
Examples
- [es] guapo “handsome”; guapísimo “indescribably handsome”
Degree in other languages: [am] [ar] [bg] [bxr] [ca] [ckb] [cop] [cs] [cu] [da] [de] [el] [en] [es] [et] [eu] [fa] [fi] [fo] [fr] [ga] [gl] [got] [grc] [he] [hi] [hr] [hu] [id] [it] [ja] [kk] [kmr] [ko] [la] [lv] [mr] [nl] [no] [pl] [pt] [ro] [ru] [sa] [sk] [sla] [sl] [so] [sr] [sv] [swl] [ta] [tr] [u] [ug] [uk] [ur] [urj] [vi] [yue] [zh]